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Feb. 18th, 2010 09:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impyAnother song that will probably never fail to return me to my teenage self: The Freshman. Oh, Verve Pipe, you brought me at least two really good songs. Why does no one love you like I love you? *muses*
In other news, due to Friday's snow-pacalypse being shared with the residents of Hell (it snowed here. DUDE.) I missed work because the parentals didn't trust the roads and my brother was busy getting hammered. So I read Sea Glass which is the second book in the Glass trilogy, which takes place in the same world the Study trilogy did. (You. Go read Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder now! Thank me later, read now!) and then wept because the back of the book with its little tease said I had to wait until 2011 for the next book. (Good Reads assures me this is a vicious, horrible lie and I'm willing to believe that.) Perhaps most of my misery stemmed from the fact that I loved Storm Glass but found Sea to be filled with instances of Opal being a complete and utter twit who whined waaaaaaaaay too much, even considering her frequent jailtime adventures. Neon signs told her things were bad ideas. Other characters told her she was being stubborn and willfully doing stupid things. Did them anyway. Bad guys told her that she was walking into their traps and they expected better and she was still hellbent on doing them. ALL OF THIS I CAN OVERLOOK. It's the fucking whining that goes on that made me want to read faster to run away from it.
In short, it suffered from being book 2 in a trilogy. It happens and it wasn't so painful that I had to fling the book away from me like, I dunno, Order of the Phoenix or something. By the end you wanted to smack Opal around. A lot.
Still, since it's only early 2010 and I lack book number three yet, I switched to another book. That is apparently also going to be a series. o_O Are they giving series away like candy? Write one book and then make a million more in the same world only? I digress.
This is one of those books I saw while at Books-A-Million before Christmas. I thought the cover was beautiful. It is. Look at that. Someone did a fantastic freakin' job right there. I want that baby postersized or something. The little blurb above tells me to expect thrills and chills.
You might notice I'm spending a lot of time not discussing the actual book. There might be a very good reason for that. Prime example of do not judge book by cover. Cover. Gorgeous. Haunting. Actually a little scary because you sort of expect her hands to move and her face to either a) be crying blood or something or b) be horrific.
The book? Not... so much. I wanted to like it. I really did. It even reads quickly and isn't awful. It's just... I expected something else? The book opens in 1854 so right off the bat you know someone's immortal or has a pastlife thing going on because you're betting this story is NOT set entirely in 1854. You would be right. There's some off-putting stuff with dude loving this girl but not really but totally even though he acts like an ass to her.
And my brain ceases to process anything further until I put the book down and engage in a little debate with my shoulder devil and shoulder angel. On the one hand, I loathe how people can link anything back to Twilight without even trying. On the other hand, Edward Cullen has spent the last few years being trotted out as one of the best examples of an asshole otherworldly boyfriend. He might ultimately save your life, but he'll make you miserable before and after, possibly even during this heroic event. And he's going to stalk you because he's in love with you but blahblahblah extenuating circumstances.
I get that this isn't really anything new. I get that girls, particularly teenage girls, like guys who treat them like shit for whatever reason. Tame the bad boy and it means so much more. I can't even claim that I didn't indulge in this phase before. (I did, it bit me on the ass, and I really don't find it cute nor did I before I was a part of it, k?)
But as I read Fallen, I really couldn't figure out why the hell these two were being drawn together other than the really obvious. Past lives. Right. Gotcha. But before Daniel (our hero) is ever properly introduced to Luce (our heroine) he flips her off.
And immediately she's drawn to him. He's an ass to her over and over and over and still she cannot stay away. At the same time she's got another guy, Cam, who is interested in her (don't ask why, but you can guess it has something to do with past lives and what not) but she ignores him unless he's pretty much got her secluded. But it never occurs to her to either pick going after the asshole and tell Cam she's flattered but not as interested as he is or pick Cam and ignore the asshole.
Sadly those of you with an extra couple of braincells to rub together can guess another few things. You think to yourself, "Hey, I wonder if Fallen refers not so much to some twisted love thing or falling from grace because Luce may or may not have torched a dude last summer, but rather fallen angels, which is why there's all this mention of Luce dying whenever Daniel tells her the truth?" You wonder this before the start of the modern day story pretty much. And, I'm gonna ruin this since I did warn you about spoilers, DUDE. Fallen angels.
I guess my real beef, aside from the love story that I think I'm too old for, is that she's got a fun set-up. Reform school that looks like one of those places you see in the South (possibly the rest of the country/world/whatever) where the land is trying to reclaim whatever was built upon it. Pluff mud is mentioned. Is nifty. Luce (and quite a few other characters) is there because she might possibly be insane. She sees shadows everywhere and they freak her out. But to avoid the antipsychotic meds, she's taken to pretending she doesn't see them. Fair enough. Then there's that torched a dude thing. Say wha? She spends half the book freaking out about this and not being able to remember anything really about it, but then this plot thread is left dangling for the next book. It shouldn't. You've got plenty of threads already. Gimme resolution on this one.
Then you've got the other inmates at the school and then the one semi normal person who has access to everyone's records. All this potential squandered on someone mooning over a jackass fallen angel. Blah blah blah, there's a fire and an innocent bystander dies, blah blah blah, you realize pretty quickly that the guy who acts decently towards our heroine (and he does for a good chunk of the book) is really on the bad side of fallen angels and then shit hits the fan when Luce realizes the truth about Daniel and doesn't immediately keel over. Probably having to do with not having been brought up religious, but that definitely comes into play when it turns out that this little loophole will mean that if she dies this cycle, she's really going to be gone. Really, cuz I figured that out the moment she said her parents were agnostic. Where you been?
The angels fight but we don't get to see much more than shadowy locusts and twinkles from the 'good' angels. Instead we run away with Luce who is betrayed by the one teacher at the school she liked and then the one friend we'd kept up with (the other, Arriane, kind of shifted off the map for whatever reason) is killed and I'm ready for this book to be over. Why does crazy librarian want Daniel "freed" from Luce? Why should I care when the only freakin' reveal of this whole book is one I guessed way back in chapter one?
In summary, dude. Not scary at all. What the hell was P.C. Cast reading to make her think this was at all, in any way, scary? Or, for that matter, sexy? I'd wanted to read those books but now I wonder...
Anyway. I liked a lot of the characters, actually, but they were all put through their paces in order to reveal something most of you could probably have already guessed. The others? I don't think would give a right royal damn. So... I'm conflicted as to whether I'll pick up book two.
In other news, due to Friday's snow-pacalypse being shared with the residents of Hell (it snowed here. DUDE.) I missed work because the parentals didn't trust the roads and my brother was busy getting hammered. So I read Sea Glass which is the second book in the Glass trilogy, which takes place in the same world the Study trilogy did. (You. Go read Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder now! Thank me later, read now!) and then wept because the back of the book with its little tease said I had to wait until 2011 for the next book. (Good Reads assures me this is a vicious, horrible lie and I'm willing to believe that.) Perhaps most of my misery stemmed from the fact that I loved Storm Glass but found Sea to be filled with instances of Opal being a complete and utter twit who whined waaaaaaaaay too much, even considering her frequent jailtime adventures. Neon signs told her things were bad ideas. Other characters told her she was being stubborn and willfully doing stupid things. Did them anyway. Bad guys told her that she was walking into their traps and they expected better and she was still hellbent on doing them. ALL OF THIS I CAN OVERLOOK. It's the fucking whining that goes on that made me want to read faster to run away from it.
In short, it suffered from being book 2 in a trilogy. It happens and it wasn't so painful that I had to fling the book away from me like, I dunno, Order of the Phoenix or something. By the end you wanted to smack Opal around. A lot.
Still, since it's only early 2010 and I lack book number three yet, I switched to another book. That is apparently also going to be a series. o_O Are they giving series away like candy? Write one book and then make a million more in the same world only? I digress.
This is one of those books I saw while at Books-A-Million before Christmas. I thought the cover was beautiful. It is. Look at that. Someone did a fantastic freakin' job right there. I want that baby postersized or something. The little blurb above tells me to expect thrills and chills.
You might notice I'm spending a lot of time not discussing the actual book. There might be a very good reason for that. Prime example of do not judge book by cover. Cover. Gorgeous. Haunting. Actually a little scary because you sort of expect her hands to move and her face to either a) be crying blood or something or b) be horrific.
The book? Not... so much. I wanted to like it. I really did. It even reads quickly and isn't awful. It's just... I expected something else? The book opens in 1854 so right off the bat you know someone's immortal or has a pastlife thing going on because you're betting this story is NOT set entirely in 1854. You would be right. There's some off-putting stuff with dude loving this girl but not really but totally even though he acts like an ass to her.
And my brain ceases to process anything further until I put the book down and engage in a little debate with my shoulder devil and shoulder angel. On the one hand, I loathe how people can link anything back to Twilight without even trying. On the other hand, Edward Cullen has spent the last few years being trotted out as one of the best examples of an asshole otherworldly boyfriend. He might ultimately save your life, but he'll make you miserable before and after, possibly even during this heroic event. And he's going to stalk you because he's in love with you but blahblahblah extenuating circumstances.
I get that this isn't really anything new. I get that girls, particularly teenage girls, like guys who treat them like shit for whatever reason. Tame the bad boy and it means so much more. I can't even claim that I didn't indulge in this phase before. (I did, it bit me on the ass, and I really don't find it cute nor did I before I was a part of it, k?)
But as I read Fallen, I really couldn't figure out why the hell these two were being drawn together other than the really obvious. Past lives. Right. Gotcha. But before Daniel (our hero) is ever properly introduced to Luce (our heroine) he flips her off.
And immediately she's drawn to him. He's an ass to her over and over and over and still she cannot stay away. At the same time she's got another guy, Cam, who is interested in her (don't ask why, but you can guess it has something to do with past lives and what not) but she ignores him unless he's pretty much got her secluded. But it never occurs to her to either pick going after the asshole and tell Cam she's flattered but not as interested as he is or pick Cam and ignore the asshole.
Sadly those of you with an extra couple of braincells to rub together can guess another few things. You think to yourself, "Hey, I wonder if Fallen refers not so much to some twisted love thing or falling from grace because Luce may or may not have torched a dude last summer, but rather fallen angels, which is why there's all this mention of Luce dying whenever Daniel tells her the truth?" You wonder this before the start of the modern day story pretty much. And, I'm gonna ruin this since I did warn you about spoilers, DUDE. Fallen angels.
I guess my real beef, aside from the love story that I think I'm too old for, is that she's got a fun set-up. Reform school that looks like one of those places you see in the South (possibly the rest of the country/world/whatever) where the land is trying to reclaim whatever was built upon it. Pluff mud is mentioned. Is nifty. Luce (and quite a few other characters) is there because she might possibly be insane. She sees shadows everywhere and they freak her out. But to avoid the antipsychotic meds, she's taken to pretending she doesn't see them. Fair enough. Then there's that torched a dude thing. Say wha? She spends half the book freaking out about this and not being able to remember anything really about it, but then this plot thread is left dangling for the next book. It shouldn't. You've got plenty of threads already. Gimme resolution on this one.
Then you've got the other inmates at the school and then the one semi normal person who has access to everyone's records. All this potential squandered on someone mooning over a jackass fallen angel. Blah blah blah, there's a fire and an innocent bystander dies, blah blah blah, you realize pretty quickly that the guy who acts decently towards our heroine (and he does for a good chunk of the book) is really on the bad side of fallen angels and then shit hits the fan when Luce realizes the truth about Daniel and doesn't immediately keel over. Probably having to do with not having been brought up religious, but that definitely comes into play when it turns out that this little loophole will mean that if she dies this cycle, she's really going to be gone. Really, cuz I figured that out the moment she said her parents were agnostic. Where you been?
The angels fight but we don't get to see much more than shadowy locusts and twinkles from the 'good' angels. Instead we run away with Luce who is betrayed by the one teacher at the school she liked and then the one friend we'd kept up with (the other, Arriane, kind of shifted off the map for whatever reason) is killed and I'm ready for this book to be over. Why does crazy librarian want Daniel "freed" from Luce? Why should I care when the only freakin' reveal of this whole book is one I guessed way back in chapter one?
In summary, dude. Not scary at all. What the hell was P.C. Cast reading to make her think this was at all, in any way, scary? Or, for that matter, sexy? I'd wanted to read those books but now I wonder...
Anyway. I liked a lot of the characters, actually, but they were all put through their paces in order to reveal something most of you could probably have already guessed. The others? I don't think would give a right royal damn. So... I'm conflicted as to whether I'll pick up book two.
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Date: 2010-02-19 06:56 pm (UTC)